Help with my first tank

This is a discussion on Help with my first tank within the Tropical Fish Diseases forums, part of the Freshwater Fish and Aquariums category; -->
Hi!
I got my first tank two weeks ago. Its a nice, small 10 gallon tank and I got all of the equipment from ...

I got my first tank two weeks ago. Its a nice, small 10 gallon tank and I got all of the equipment from a pet store. Sadly I got very bad advice at the same time and am now having some trouble. They sold me no less than 8 fish (4 anglefish, 2 clown loaches and 2 bottom dwellers) in less than a week and said nothing about the cycle. I learned about that browsing the internet. Now 2 of the fish are dead and the remaining 6 are showing signs of stress and aggression. I was lucky enough to get a cheep 50 gallon tank and am setting it up now. I was hoping to add the remaining 6 fish to the new tank and try to start a new cycle from the start. Do you think it is a good idea or is there something else I could do to save my fish?

I got my first tank two weeks ago. Its a nice, small 10 gallon tank and I got all of the equipment from a pet store. Sadly I got very bad advice at the same time and am now having some trouble. They sold me no less than 8 fish (4 anglefish, 2 clown loaches and 2 bottom dwellers) in less than a week and said nothing about the cycle. I learned about that browsing the internet. Now 2 of the fish are dead and the remaining 6 are showing signs of stress and aggression. I was lucky enough to get a cheep 50 gallon tank and am setting it up now. I was hoping to add the remaining 6 fish to the new tank and try to start a new cycle from the start. Do you think it is a good idea or is there something else I could do to save my fish?

Thank you in advance,
Arnar

Put the fish in the 50. Having those fish in a 10gallon is very bad.

Clown loaches can get up to 12" long, so they need a very large tank. Angles need a large tank as wel; espically for having 4.

One more question. Since its painful to look at them swiming in water of so poor quality, for how long does the new tank need to stand full befor I add the fish?

There are a lot of many ways to do a cycle (that would be the word). The fastest way is to use fish, but it not the nicest. Not using anything can take a very long time. Another "good" way is to use fish food to cycle.

The absolute fastest way is to go to your LFS and get a few Zebra Danios. Maybe 4 or 5, around there. They are very hardy fish and usually survive cycles. Treat them like you would any other fish.

Keep checking your water params with them untill you see what you like. After it is cycled, you can put all the fish in your 10 and put them in the 50, and then leave the danios in there or put them in the 10.

I'm afraid simply adding all your current fish to a newly cycled tank would be a bad idea. You see, you need to let your biological filtration build up slowly. So it would be best to add the fish slowly over a long period of time.

You have some heavy hitters there too. By heavy hitters I mean very demanding on your bio-load, which is the amount of waste your biological filtration can handle. If I were you I would try to return your fish, cycle the bigger tank with some Danios as suggested, and then start stocking the tank SLOWLY with smaller fish, like rasboras, or various tetras. Once the tank stabilizes with those, and the you build a decent biological filtration, you can slowly add more fish. After you add new fish, it is good to check your water parameters. And by that I mean by picking up a master liquid test kit, and testing for Ammonia, Nitrite, and Nitrate. When you add new fish, you may see a rise in ammonia and nitrates, which is normal. But it is the time given to let your biological filtration catch up with this new demand until you start to see it stabilizing. By that I mean absolutely no traces of Ammonia or Nitrite, and a Nitrate reading of under 40ppm. I usually wait at least a month after I add new fish to add anything else, but the test results will be your best call.

Let me know if you have any questions. And I'm sure other people here can help steer you in the right direction for types of fish to start off with.